The 13-inch MacBook Pro you really want and an updated iMac may be en route soon.

Per the oft-controversial DigiTimes, new 13-inch MacBook Pros with Retina display and updated all-in-one iMacs are now being shipped by Apple’s upstream supply chain, according to a new report.

Anonymous tipsters reportedly indicated that the new 13.3-inch MacBook Pro with Retina Display should officially launch in September or October.

The report also indicated that Apple planned to launch three models of the new iMac, but yield problems with panels led the company to postpone mass production of “the high-end model.” No details on exactly which model that is, whether “high-end” was defined through size or hardware speed, was provided.

The information somewhat aligns with what analyst Ming-Chi Kuo of KGI Securities indicated about the new iMacs last August. He said production issues with the all-in-one desktop would lead to the 21.5-inch model launching at a sooner date than the larger 27-inch model.

The new iMacs are not expected to feature high-definition Retina displays, but will reportedly have a redesigned chassis along with Intel’s latest Ivy Bridge processors.

The production issues are said to be caused largely by a new “full-lamination process” that will attach the display panel to the protective cover glass as part of the new design.

The web site first reported in April that Apple planned to feature a new glass front design of the updated iMac lineup. It was said that the new models would feature anti-reflective display technology, and that they would be notably thinner than current models.

Per a tweet from Wall Street Journal writer Dennis Berman, Apple is apparently developing a streaming-music service that is similar to Pandora. The news comes six days before Apple’s Sept. 12 media event.

Berman said details will be posted on the Wall Street Journal’s site shortly, albeit an unidentified source said that Apple is in talks with music providers to secured the additional licensing needed to proceed with the service. The paper’s source said it would work on all Apple devices and possibly PCs running Windows.

It’s hard to say what the specific reason behind this is, but there are definitely a few guesses.

Per Reuters, Industry sources claim Apple has cut orders for Samsung memory modules to be used in its upcoming next-generation iPhone, saying the first batch of handsets widely expected to launch on Sept. 21 following a Sept. 12 debut, will not carry chips made by the South Korean company.

While Apple will continue to use Samsung-made DRAM and NAND flash modules in future products, the Cupertino tech giant is tapering orders made to its smartphone rival, an unnamed supply chain source told Reuters on Friday, Korean local time.

A separate report from The Korean Economic Daily cites another person familiar with the matter who said Apple dropped Samsung memory completely for initial iPhone rollout. Taking the place of Samsung’s units will be parts made by Toshiba, Elpida Memory and SK Hynix.

“Samsung is still in the list of initial memory chip suppliers (for new iPhones),” said the Reuters source. “But Apple orders have been trending down and Samsung is making up for the reduced order from others, notably Samsung’s handset business.”

The person went on to say the move away from Samsung is in line with Apple’s plan to diversify its supply chain, and is not in response to the two companies’ worldwide patent dispute. The iPhone maker has been attempting to reduce its reliance on Samsung parts for months, the most recent move prompting the Korean electronics giant’s value to fall over concern that it would be shut out as an Apple supplier.

The high demand for Apple products frequently outweighs supply, especially at big launches like the upcoming next-generation iPhone, and the company is looking to spread out its supply chain to combat possible component shortages that would cause a production slowdown.

Samsung is the sole supplier of the Retina displays used in the third-generation iPad, and fabricates the A-series SoCs found in Apple’s iDevice line, as well as a number of other integral components.

Apple is expected to debut the sixth-generation iPhone at a Sept. 12 special event, which will be followed by a rollout on Sept. 21.

Yes, the potential of a new iMac is cool…but it might not have a Retina display.

Per AppleInsider, Apple’s iMac will reportedly receive a hardware redesign before the end of the year, but the desktop won’t receive a high-resolution Retina display.

Two new iMac models in sizes 21.5 and 27 inches were detailed on Friday by analyst Ming-Chi Kuo of KGI Securities as two of the eight new products Apple is reportedly preparing to release this fall. Kuo, who has a reliable track record, believes the new 21.5-inch iMac will debut in September, while a larger 27-inch iMac is expected to debut in late October.

According to Kuo, the new iMac will not feature a Retina display this year, but he expects the new Macs to “still prove attractive to consumers.” Interest in the new models, beyond the anticipated Ivy Bridge processors, will come from what Kuo said will be a “brand new design.”

Display quality on the new iMacs will reportedly be improved with a new “full-lamination process,” attaching the display panel to the protective cover glass.

This new production method apparently comes at a cost, though: According to Kuo, the larger 27-inch iMac has a lower yield rate with the new full-lamination method. Thus, Juo expects the 27-inch iMac to debut 6 to 8 weeks after the 21.5-inch model.

Another big seller in the holiday season, Kuo believes, will be the new 13-inch MacBook Pro with Retina display. He has predicted that Apple will aggressively price the new MacBook Pro under US$1,300, which will help drive strong demand at launch.

Kuo’s predictions call for Apple to ship nearly 1.5 million iMac units in the fourth quarter of calendar 2012. With all other Mac models thrown into the mix, he believes Apple will ship a total of 5.5 million units in the holiday shopping quarter.

If Apple can achieve that number, it would likely ensure a new sales record for the company. Apple’s previous best quarter for Macs came in the holiday season of 2011, when the company sold 5.2 million Macs in a three-month span.

Only time will tell, so hang tight and we’ll bring you additional information as it becomes available.

Per AppleInsider, with Apple’s iMac lineup due for an upgrade to Intel’s Ivy Bridge processors, stock of the larger 27-inch all-in-one desktop has become even more depleted ahead of a possible refresh.

Availability of the 27-inch iMac is now limited at most retailers seen in the AppleInsider pricing guide. In particular, the low-end 2.7-gigahertz model is currently out of stock at Amazon, MacMall, MacConnection, Best Buy, and J&R. For now, the desktop remains in stock at B&H.

Availability of the high-end 3.1-gigahertz model is slightly better. That configuration is currently sold out at Best Buy and J&R, while limited stock is available at Amazon.

A shortage of 27-inch iMacs was also noted on Friday by MacRumors which found that the base-level machine is currently sold out at 120 of Apple’s 249 U.S. retail locations, while the high-end configuration is unavailable at 135 retail stores.

While supply of the 27-inch iMac has dwindled, there are no such signs of constrained inventory for the 21.5-inch model. Both Apple’s retail stores and authorized resellers show the smaller iMac model to have adequate availability.

Supply of the 27-inch iMac first began to dry up last month, as resellers started to see limited availability of the big-screen desktop. Supply constraints at Mac resellers is often one of the first signs that Apple is drawing down inventory ahead of a product update.

The iMac line’s most recent refresh arrived over a year ago, in early May of 2011. Analyst Ming-Chi Kuo said in July that he expects Apple to refresh its iMac lineup with Intel’s Ivy Bridge processors as soon as September.

Earlier this month, internal configuration files in Mountain Lion were discovered to make apparent references to unreleased new generations of the iMac, as well as the Mac Pro. The new iMac was labeled as (iMac13,0), while the Mac Pro was identified as (MacPro6,0).

In addition, a new 13th-generation iMac identified as “iMac 13,2” has already appeared in Geekbench benchmarks. That machine was seen running Mountain Lion with an Intel Core i7-3770 processor clocked at 3.4-gigahertz with 4 gigabytes of 1600-megahertz DDR3 RAM.

Per the cool cats at MacRumors and his own blog, developer Marco Arment he noticed the two “curious entries” in Instapaper’s device stats on Friday, positing the device identifiers could offer clues to the supposed tablets’ internal hardware.

As a side note, Arment said, “There were also a few iPhone5,1 devices, but that’s not a surprise — that’s almost certainly next month’s new GSM iPhone,” but didn’t give specifics.

While Arment concedes the unknown “iPad2,5” and “iPad2,6” identifiers can conceivably be spoofed, he has “never had a device show up [on the logs] that didn’t end up being a real, about-to-be-released Apple device.”

Arment goes on to explain that when Apple first launched the iPad 2 in 2011, the Wi-Fi, GSM and CDMA versions were tagged with the internal designations iPad2,1, iPad2,2 and iPad2,3, respectively. Alongside the release of the New iPad in March, Apple unveiled a quietly updated iPad 2 Wi-Fi model with a new A5 processor manufactured on the 32nm process, identifying it as “iPad2,4.”

It is possible that the new “iPad2,5” and “iPad2,6” devices discovered by Arment could simply be GSM and CDMA versions of the iPad 2 carrying the 32nm A5 chip, but the developer believes such a move would be unusual so late in the product’s lifecycle.

If the unknown devices turn out to be a smaller iPad, Arment said, the Apple-assigned identifiers suggest “the iPad Mini is, effectively, an iPad 2” with an A5 processor and 512MB of RAM.

“This is all speculation, of course,” Arment writes, “but I’m convinced: like the leaked Dock connector, this move is so ingenius that it’s most likely to be what Apple has really done.

Apple is rumored to debut the so-called “iPad mini” at a special event in October. Many expect the tablet to sport a 7.85-inch screen and boast a design resembling an iPod touch.

Per All Things D, Apple is looking to hold a media event for Apple’s so-called “iPad mini” will be held in October, after the anticipated Sept. 12 iPhone event. That means Apple has two “blockbuster events” lined up for product debuts this fall.

“Only after the next generation iPhone is out the door and on sale will Apple announce the smaller iPad it’s been working on,” author John Paczkowski wrote. “That device, which is expected to have a display of less than eight inches, will be uncrated at a second special event, which sources said is currently scheduled for October.”

The anonymous sources who spoke with Paczkowski confirm earlier comments from both Jim Dalrymple of The Loop and John Gruber of Daring Fireball, both of which indicated this week that they expect Apple to hold two separate events for the new iPhone and iPad mini. Gruber said an event in the first or second week in October would be in line with iPod events that Apple has held for the last decade.

You’ve been waiting for the iPhone to support the Long Term Evolution (LTE)/4G protocol for a while.

It looks like you might get your wish.

Per Korea Times, SK Telecom and KT, two official Korean iPhone wireless carriers, have both been in talks to offer LTE connectivity on Apple’s next handed, officials from both companies reportedly told the Korea Times under the veil of anonymity.

Although industry trends and the inclusion of LTE in this year’s iPad models both point to an LTE-capable iPhone next month, supporting the technology isn’t as clean cut as supporting existing 3G networks, which all operate within a 2.1-gigahertz frequency.

“KT is in negotiation with Apple to persuade the latter to support KT’s 1.8-gigahertz frequency in Korea for the upcoming iPhone,’’ said one senior KT executive, who asked not to be identified. Meanwhile, SK Telecom is also reportedly pushing for the same treatment for its 800-megahertz frequency LTE network. It sent this week an official to Apple’s Cupertino-based headquarters in hopes of hammering out a deal.

The number of LTE subscribers in Korea reached 8.4 million by the end of July, with 4 million of them choosing SK’s network and another 1.4 hinged to KT’s. The two iPhone providers, along with rival carrier LG Uplus, have been heavily promoting LTE devices on their network to much success.

The carriers fear, however, that sales of the new iPhone will suffer in much the same way that sales of Apple’s new iPad have lagged behind in the region because Apple has thus far refused to support the local carriers’ frequencies in the LTE-equipped versions of the tablet.

“KT is eager to narrow the market gap with SK Telecom and even LG Uplus in the fight for LTE-enabled devices,” said another KT source. “If the talks with Apple produce visible results, then we will rise as the top LTE service provider in Korea.”

Apple had balked at the inclusion of LTE connectivity in previous generations of the iPhone because because the first wave of LTE chipset were a bit too large and power-hungry for the company’s liking. Since then, more advanced designs from chipmakers like Qualcomm have mitigated those concerns.

In the US, Verizon LTE network uses a 700-megahertz frequency, while AT&T operates both 700-megahertz and 2.1-gigahertz LTE networks.

For its part, Sprint’s utilization a 800-megahertz frequency for LTE saw it left out of Apple’s LTE iPad plans earlier this year but subsequent reports claim the carrier has already forged a deal with Apple to make sure the omission doesn’t carry over to the launch of the so-called iPhone 5 next month.

The next-gen iPhone, it’s probably coming a lot sooner than you expect.

Per the cool cats at Boy Genius Report, Apple, which is expected to formally introduce its latest iPhone to the world on September 12th, could begin shipping the device to customers and selling the handset in retail stores just a week or two later, according to a new report.

Citing a trusted AT&T source, BGR reported Monday that the “carrier is currently planning to launch Apple’s next-generation iPhone during the third or fourth week of September, with an all-hands-on-deck policy in place for employees that will extend through to the middle of October.”

A second source reportedly added that a large training event for regional AT&T employees has therefore been rescheduled from the first week of October due to a conflict with a “huge announcement.”

A rapid go-to-market strategy that would have customers clutching Apple’s latest handset just days after being announced by the company is impressive but not unprecedented.

After repositioning its iPhone introduction from the summer timeframe to the fall, Apple last year introduced the iPhone 4S on October 4th and began shipping the device to customers and retail stores on October 14th — Just 10 days later.

And you have to love leaks about really cool upcoming products even more.

Per MacRumors and AppleInsider, the GeekBench scores for an unreleased 13-inch MacBook Pro notebook with Retina display designated by the ambiguous identifier “MacBook Pro 10,2” has appeared over on the Primate Labs web site.

The profile of the machine accompanying the Geekbench scores includes the same Intel Core i7-3520M Ivy Bridge processor clocked at 2.9 gigahertz as the earlier sighting, but indicates the notebook was outfitted with 8GB of RAM and is running a newer, yet unreleased build of OS X Mountain Lion 10.8.1.

The “10,2” model designation makes it distinct from the existing 13 and 15-inch MacBook Pro 9,x models Apple released in June and instead associates it with the slim new 15-inch Retina Display model Apple internally designates as its “MacBook Pro 10,1” model.

Given that Apple canceled its 17 inch offering (apparently due to limited sales, as analyst Ming-Chi Kuo with KGI Securities correctly predicted in April), this would strongly suggest the new model will be the rumored 13 inch version of the Retina Display MacBook Pro.

The appearance of 8GB of RAM is also noteworthy because the new design of the Retina Display MacBook Pro solders its memory chips directly to the logic board (below, highlighted in green) rather than offering user-upgradable sockets. The previous appearance of this new 13 inch model only indicated 4GB of RAM.

The unreleased new MacBook Pro model joins a new iMac and Mac Pro model designation that were recently discovered, with the new iMac similarly appearing in Geekbench results.

Per the results themselves, here you go and some things (like the idea of a 13-inch MacBook Pro with Retina display) remain pretty sexy: